THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — International Criminal Court judges reluctantly dropped a case Thursday against a fugitive Sudanese rebel accused of attacking African Union peacekeepers in Darfur nearly 20 years ago, after prosecutors said they could no longer prove their case at trial.Judges were unusually critical of prosecutors at the global court in a written decision made public last week approving their request to drop charges against Abdallah Banda, who faced three war crimes counts related to his alleged involvement in a deadly 2007 attack on a peacekeeping camp in northern Darfur.In a written statement, the court said Thursday that judges “found that the Prosecution had not demonstrated that the evidence supporting the confirmed charges deteriorated to an extent such that the case could no longer proceed to trial.”But the judges ruled that “proceeding to trial in this particular case, with a Prosecutor who refuses to present the case despite evidentiary and legal obligations to do so, would be in contravention of the Chamber’s ultimate obligation to ensure a fair and efficient trial.”
Prosecutors acknowledged that their request would have an impact on 103 victims in the case “who have been waiting for over 15 years for justice for the crimes committed during the attack” on the peacekeepers. However, they argued that they suffered setbacks, including two key witnesses who are no longer considered credible and a new witness who came forward with testimony that could help to clear Banda.“As a result, the Prosecution now no longer considers there are reasonable prospects of convicting Mr. Banda on any of the charges against him,” prosecutors wrote in their request to have the charges dropped. They said that an independent analyst who studied the evidence agreed with their assessment.
